Don’t Take on a Client Who Can’t Answer These 7 Questions

As a conflict consultant, mediator, conflict coach or a motivational speaker, are you continually frustrated when you arrive at a clients’ business and they immediately hit you with a problem that they want solved cheaply, immediately and permanently?

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They want you to come in, put on a Band-Aid and then leave, but not before answering these questions laid out here http://tinyurl.com/q9ef9no.and if you can’t, then getting thrown out of the door. Or never getting a callback on a project that you know your skills would be perfect for.

And if you can’t answer them to the client’s satisfaction, then you risk getting thrown out of the door.

Or never getting a callback on a project that you know your skills would be perfect for.

Meanwhile, as a professional with years of, not only academic experience, but also practical experience, you can tell from the decision maker’s, or gatekeeper’s, immediate description of the conflict or issue, that the problem is so much deeper. And that a cosmetic solution is not going to work.

And that a cosmetic solution is not going to work.

Here are seven questions to ask they about their business that will help you weed through the clients who are seriously committed to changing their organizational cultures from those who are only committed to the now, the immediate and the solution that will keep them out of litigation.

  1. What kind of conflicts do you have in your business right now? Every business has conflicts: Between managers and managers, between employees and managers and between executives and management. If the client isn’t self-aware enough to acknowledge that honestly, then that’s a problem.
  1. How are your responses to conflicts living up to the core values of your business? Punting (avoidance), false empowerment of employees and managers (accommodation) or going to legal and then firing somebody (attack) are all responses to conflicts. Sometimes the responses are representative of true core values, not the ones published on the masthead.
  1. Have you ever failed personally at resolving a business conflict? Again, the decision maker or gatekeeper should have a certain level of self-awareness and accountability around all their business decisions: from the fun financial ones to the difficult personnel ones.
  1. What non-HR, non-legal related systems do you have in place currently to manage employee-employee and employee-supervisor conflicts? HR exists to understand laws and regulations, to engage in on-boarding new employees and to retain older employees. Legal exists to litigate, purely and simply. Neither of these departments in an organization are always useful for dealing with behavioral, cognitive based conflicts in a business.
  1. How do you let people go? Organizational cultures grow up around three areas: recruiting and hiring, training and retaining and firing and laying off employees. How the last area is addressed is key to understanding how deep organizational dysfunction goes.
  1. When was the last time you examined how you deal with conflicts in your business personally?This reads like a therapeutic question, but decision makers and gatekeepers are people first before anything else. And everybody learns how to address difficulty starting at home as a child.
  1. We have been talking for 45 minutes now, describe for me how you see me challenging your business culture to evolve and grow? Resolving conflicts, teaching new skills to employees and managers and addressing engagement requires businesses to evolve in their business models.

This is inherently a challenge, but such radical growth allows a company to shift in an economy increasingly built on a model of not only clients but also employees, acting as brand ambassadors on social media, word-of-mouth and in a collaborative economy.

And really, all of these questions, for you as a conflict resolution professional, should serve to provide you understanding and to answer the real question: Are the clients open to the hard, disruptive challenge of true, meaningful and lasting change, or do they just want a cosmetic, Band-Aid application?

-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email:jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter:www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Infographic] CEOS and Employee Engagement

Hello!

If you are a small business owner in the Southern Tier of NY State, then the infographic below, courtesy of our friends at ADRtimes (http://networkedblogs.com/KAG0M) applies to you as well.

What CEOs Should Know About Employee Engagement

What CEOs Should Know About Employee Engagement infographicPlease consider HSCT for all of your employee engagement needs.-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Guest Blogger] Larry Wolverton: So you want to be an entrepreneur? Are you sure? Are you really sure?

The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.” – Vidal Sassoon
If what you are doing is not moving you towards your goals, then it’s moving you away from your goals.” – Brian Tracy
We here at Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT) are committed to helping each one of our clients (and our potential future clients) to ethically attain peace in their lives through the real-world application of Christian ethical principles.
We are also committed to collaboration and collaborative learning from other professionals, not only in our field, but in fields that interest us and can provide us insight, such as the arts, engineering, medicine, and so on.
With that in mind, we are launching our Guest Blogger series.
For the remainder of April and May, as the leaves begin to pop out and spring visits our country, we will be featuring the thoughts, opinions and commentary of professionals in the field of mediation and conflict engagement.
We hope that these writings will inspire and engage YOU to ethically attain PEACE in YOUR life.
Our first guest blogger is Larry Wolverton, Change Maker & Chief Connector at Top Tier Liaison & Conflict Resolution Services in Arizona.
Connect with them through their website at http://www.toptierlcrservices.com/
Top Tier focuses on developing communication around change in businesses and organizations through the use of analyses, methodology and a multidisciplinary approach to communication between employees and management.
 Larry has multiple years of experience in education and with healthcare start-ups as well as international experience that he brings to the conflict engagement and communication table.

Today I am thinking about the “Entrepreneurial Spirit” and those traits that I feel make for a contented, happy, self-employed person. I will also explore what it means to be an entrepreneur, both in your own business or as a valued employee of another company.
Most people I have met had, at one time or another, “toyed” with the idea of starting their own business, so the idea is attractive for several reasons; potential unlimited income only constrained by our own efforts, freedom to make our own schedule, and doing things “our own way” are just a few advantages that we see successful entrepreneurs sharing with us in their highly visible life styles.
Not mentioned are the 60-100 or more hours per week required during the start-up phase (up to five years on average), or the stress of development of an idea for public consumption, the work required to create a clear business plan and company direction, and of course the ever high hurdle of financing a new business or business idea.
I would like to point out that to be a successful entrepreneur failure is a necessary ingredient in the mix of experiences required on the path to success. There is a very fine line between failure and success.
Learning how to manage failure and learn those lessons from “fantastic failure” is just one of those dues required to understand how to succeed in business.
I have paid those dues, however I feel the impact of those past failures has been tempered by lessons learned as an employee for others who paid to train me in production, operations, management, and other areas where transferrable skills are learned.
And for those with “great ideas”, there is the ever present negative feedback from those who “care about you.” Critical review of a new idea, product, or business plan is essential to remaining grounded. However the choice of who reviews these critical aspects of your business must be undertaken seriously so that a neutral, knowledgeable opinion is obtained.
I find the mindset shift from employee to owner/manager a natural one that also allows me to understand some of the business decisions my employer has made during my tenure at my “weekend” job, too.
So the question is more appropriate when we ask, “Do you want to be an entrepreneur, right now?” The desire to be self-employed is one that drives creativity and builds the traits necessary to actually be a business owner.
However, the learning process can and often is obtained by taking ownership of our current “day or weekend” jobs, and acting responsibly and creatively in performing above and beyond our employer’s expectations.
Today, right now, is the time to start building and demonstrating those traits that are commonly accepted as entrepreneurial and necessary to success.
Those traits include: humility, willingness to accept the need to change, a willingness to delegate and allow others to help grow the business, sharing the spotlight, listening to our industry experts and mentors, perseverance in face of “insurmountable” challenges, and a solid belief that what we are doing is right for us and our families, among many others.
And lastly, staying in the workforce and working for a company that demonstrates your personal values and goals, and that supports your efforts to be creative and a partner in growth, might be the best way to be an entrepreneur for you.
Not everyone has the luxury of taking the risks of starting their own business, and must forego that “dream” for the sake of their young family, or other reasons not highlighted here.
Taking that entrepreneurial spirit and applying it to your current job or seeking a new job more suited to your interests can be rewarding and just as fun and challenging without the stress.
Would I encourage you to go out into the world and build a business of your own? Yes, absolutely, but only if it is something you crave enough and have passion for that will drive you to follow through during challenging times.
Larry Wolverton,
Employee and Entrepreneur
Change Maker & Chief Connector
Top Tier Liaison &Conflict Resolution Services
Are you a business owner striving to bring the entrepreneurial traits of your employees out in their current jobs?
Top Tier Liaison & Conflict Resolution Services, will help you do just that through top tier, evolutionary communication.
Please see how here.

 -Peace Be With You All-Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/